Sanctuary – J-drama Episode 6 Recap & Review

Episode 6

Episode 6 of Sanctuary starts with Enno and Shizuuchi’s match. The reporter who warned Shizuuchi is in the audience filming. Enno gives Shizuuchi his best defence but the latter is very angry. Enno slaps Shizuuchi hard, knocking him out as Enno is called the winner.

The audience starts cheering for Enno, and Nanumi comes inside the ring to give him a kiss. Ensho cheers Enno too and promotes him to the highest-paying position in sumo. However, it turns out that Enno was only imagining this because it’s Shizuuchi who wins the fight and not him.

In reality, Shizuuchi had been driven by rage and beat Enno up so brutally that the latter had to be taken to the Emergency Room with his ear cut off. Ryuki watches the match from his car and is shocked.

Meanwhile, the doctors try to stitch Enno’s ear up. Ensho calls Enno’s (Oze) mother up to tell her about the injury. She asks Ensho to compensate her for the injury.

As all of this starts to kick off, Enno wakes up in the hospital bed in a completely disheveled state. His teeth are missing and his ear stitched up. Ryuki’s father watches him practice the shiko and tells his son that his wrestling was crude and lacked passion which upsets him. Meanwhile, Inokishi learns that Shizuuchi has quit sumo and left his stable. Kunishima pays Enno a visit at the hospital but finds Nanumi there.

Nanumi clings to Enno to make a show out of it and claims that she was Enno’s girlfriend. Enno himself is shocked by the revelation. However, Kunishima and Nanumi have an argument which ends with the reporter putting Nanumi in her place. Nanumi throws a fit and clings to Enno asking him to never see Kunishima again.

The reporter that followed Shizuuchi met Ryuki on his way back home. He accuses Ryuki of bribing him anonymously in order to eliminate Shizuuchi, the only wrestler that had the potential to defeat him. Ryuki denies the allegations and claims that he did no such thing, and leaves the reporter alone. The newspapers report the news of both Shizuuchi and Enya’s retirements from sumo wrestling.

Shizuuchi visits his hometown and pays a visit to his mother and brother’s memorial. He recalls his childhood when his abusive mother beat him and his brother up after his father had abandoned them. Shizuuchi protects his brother and tries to calm his mother down. Present-day Shizuuchi rests in his house, reminiscing his childhood memories.

Enno makes it back to the Ensho stable and spots Enya in the wrestling room. Shimizu plays the recording of Enno’s fight with Shizuuchi to remind him how he lost against the giant since Enno had forgotten all about the match.

As it turns out, the reporter that followed Shizuuchi is a popular exposé news writer. He asks a reputable news agency to publish his exposé on Ryuki.

Enno is still having nightmares from his injury and refuses to wake up for practice with the other wrestlers. At his stable, Ryuki’s performance is appreciated by everyone but his own father. The referee for Enno’s match – Umayama – gets a call from Inushima who asks his wrestlers to be brought to the Ensho stable for a training match.

This is Inushima’s ploy to teach Ensho a lesson when he is down. Murata calls Enno and forces him to come down for a party to celebrate his recovery. Murata forces Enno to drink expensive alcohol, and he needs to comply with his patron.

This angers Enno and he beats Murata up before leaving the party. Murata embarrasses himself when he pees his pants in front of all the hostesses. The reporter, Yasui, gets a call about his exposé article from the news agency when one of Ito’s men escort him to the car. Yasui learns that Ito was one of the patrons at Ryuki’s stable and the person that hired the reporter for exposing Shizuuchi.

The old man offers a bribe to Yasui and threatens to harm his child if he publishes the exposé article against Ryuki. The next day, there is a training match between the wrestlers from Umayama’s stable and Ensho’s stable.

Umayama’s wrestlers mock Enno to instigate him and despite his injury, Enno enters the ring. When his opponent tries to slap him, Enno recalls his injury and panics. Enno ends up embarrassing himself further as the wrestlers haze him, leaving him crying after his defeat.

The rest of the Ensho stable wrestlers also lose the matches as the opposing wrestlers haze them for being incompetent. As the wrestlers are dispersing, one of Umayama’s wrestlers mocks Enno causing the latter to attack.

The wrestler starts bleeding and the others have to calm Enno down. Ryuki’s mother thanks Ito for saving Ryuki and offers to repay his help by doing anything he would like for her to do. The old man asks Ryuki’s mother to spend the evening with him while he kisses her palm.

The Episode Review

The dynamic between Ryuki and his mother has me suspicious about Ryuki’s character. It is possible that he is not as goody-two-shoes as he pretends to be and it is possible that he was the person that tried to bribe the reporter and fled to his mother for help when the guy caught on to him. I have a feeling that the draft of this expose article could be stolen and Yasui and his family will eventually have to pay for this.

Enno finally seems to have come to his senses and I think the injury was necessary to calm his cocky attitude down. The guy really thought he was the greatest of all time and could beat every single wrestler in the world. However, his relationship with Murata is one that I am worried about. Murata was clearly embarrassed by Enno and I hope he does not use his money and power to hurt Enno by harming his father.

Shizuuchi’s backstory really has me emotional. I would much rather see a full season about his life and how he grew up to be a wrestler. We can look forward to the final two episodes to see how his character further develops.